Jalisco: 157 Unidentified Bodies with Nowhere to Go

Translated by Yaqui for Borderland Beat from: Sin Embargo

                                 The image is from a video taken by residents of Tlaquepaque.

The unidentified bodies did not fit in the facilities of the Jalisco Institute of Forensic Sciences. They put them in a trailer, and drove them from municipality to municipality. 157 unidentified dead roam Jalisco in trailer; nobody wants them and they do not fit in the forensic coolers.

A trailer with 157 bodies has traveled through at least three municipalities of Jalisco and has been stationed near housing areas. It is a refrigerated box that belongs to the State Prosecutor's Office and that protects the bodies of unidentified persons and that do not fit in the facilities of the Jalisco Institute of Forensic Sciences.

The trailer was housed in a warehouse in the La Duraznera neighborhood, in the municipality of San Pedro Tlaquepaque, waiting for the construction of 10 crypts modules with a capacity to house 800 bodies, since the facilities of the Institute of Forensic Sciences are full to the top. These crypts would be built in the area of ​​El Vado, in the municipality of Tonalá.

The neighbors of El Vado have demonstrated against the construction, accusing that they would be very close to the housing areas, so that currently the work is suspended.

Before the protest of neighbors and traders in the area of ​​La Duraznera, the Mayor of Tlaquepaque, María Elena Limón, asked the Government of the entity to comply with the agreement to remove the trailer from the warehouse, as he said they did not have the measures necessary to keep the corpses there.

"I request in the most attentive and firm way to the Government of the State to fulfill the agreement taken this afternoon by telephone, to remove in 48 hours the trailer box of these facilities, given the discontent of the population and merchants of the area, all time that the aforementioned winery does not have permits for its operation, even less to safeguard these corpses in conditions of healthiness and humanism, "he said in a statement.

The mayor also accuses that this reflects the "insufficient insufficient coordination and communication between the state and municipal authority", because at no time were they informed of this situation. Then he remembered that they had 48 hours to get the unit out of there.

Later, agents of the Office of the Prosecutor took the trailer to a Tlajomulco site on September 14. 

Neighbors of the area reported through social networks the abandonment of the unit near an area of ​​subdivisions and also began to protest the foul smell that came out of the unit, they even assured that the box shed blood.

Finally, the unit was taken to a warehouse in the industrial zone of Guadalajara, near the entity's Attorney's Office.

The neighbors of El Vado, in Tonalá, have demonstrated against the construction of the crypts, as they accused they would be very close to the housing areas. Currently the work is suspended.

And is that before, on August 22, the Secretariat announced the start of work to build 10 crypts modules of five by nine meters each, which would have a capacity to house 80 bodies per space, so that at the end they will be able to house 800 corpses.

For the massacres in Jalisco, 300 spaces they had previously to store the unidentified bodies were full That is why the use of a refrigerated trailer box. The New Justice System prevents the authorities from cremating the bodies, as they are necessary for future investigations and to clarify their deaths.

"We will have to withstand foul odors and ashes, depending on the direction of the wind. In addition to the other problems that could lead to trying to be recovered bodies in a violent way, "said the neighbors organized in a Board.

According to the newspaper El Informador , only 3,942 autopsies were performed this year, which means an average of 16 daily procedures.